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It seems to be that the article is confusing neutrality or suspended judgment with avoiding judgment. It is not pretending to be wise, it is indifference. A t

It seems to be that the article is confusing neutrality or suspended judgment with avoiding judgment. It is not pretending to be wise, it is indifference. A teacher who sees two children in a fight has likely seen those children fight before. After seeing the same fight occur over and over they just don't care who started it. Figuring out who started it becomes a chicken and an egg situation. This example from the article reveals an interesting point about passing judgment in general: ...judges in the actual legal system can repeatedly hand down real verdicts without automatically losing their reputation for impartiality That is because judges rule based on a set of written laws which they interpret depending on the situation. Picking ethical or moral side of a situation has no such standard. Perhaps the writer also missed the idea that the majority of people in this world do not like conflict. Having to pick sides creates conflict. They are not trying to be wise as much as they are trying to avoid something that makes them uncomfortable. Arguments are not black and white. Demanding the people pass judgment over situation where they do not know all of the information, do not have a set measurement for passing judgment and most likely do not care is unwise.

Alex3917 18y ago
"It seems to be that the article is confusing neutrality or suspended judgment with avoiding judgment." I think the article has that right, I just think it just confuses what it means to suspend judgment. Saying you don't care who started it isn't the same as suspending judgment pending further investigation; rather, it's a form of jumping to judgment prematurely. Judgment in the case of a fight doesn't have to take the form of a (false) dichotomy; I'd argue that saying it doesn't matter who started it is a third form of judgment. Truly suspending judgment pending further investigation of who started the fight would in fact be the wisest course of action.
joe_the_user 18y ago
It sounds easy to say but I think the author of the article needs to grow up. Sorry, but it doesn't matter who started a fight on the playground. How old is he and he still cares about such things? It actually is wisdom to realize that you should stop caring about who started fights - not always but often. Here's idea. Being mature involves realizing there are many kind of stupidities in the world and that most conflicts involve one kind of stupidity battling another kind of stupidity so neither side is really worth taking.
- patio11 18y ago
  How old is he and he still cares about such things? I think it is sort of silly for somebody to have to kill himself for other people to give a shit about his physical wellbeing, but since suicide fairly reliably makes people actually care about things, I note that most authorities put the number of suicides as a result of bullying at between one and two dozen a year in the US. This means that bullies are more effective at killing American children than terrorists, school shootings, earthquakes, tornadoes, hurricanes, sharks, and kidnappers motivated by ransom. Combined. But who cares about such things?
  - Eliezer 18y ago
    Well said. I really have to wonder whether other people had such different childhoods than mine - if they were actually engaging in spontaneous random playground fights with no aggressor - or if they just have very convenient amnesia. "How old is he and he still cares about such things" - this question is the essence of why not caring is a pretension of wisdom, and I'm glad that the illustration was so nicely provided.
- jerf 18y ago
  "Sorry, but it doesn't matter who started a fight on the playground." It's an example, not the whole of the argument. And the example is more about the principal than the children. The principal should care about who is starting fights, if they actually want to affect whether there are fights in the future. They don't, for many reasons including ones discussed in the article, so they don't care, either. School examples have the virtue of appealing to most people's common experience.
patio11 18y ago
Figuring out who started it becomes a chicken and an egg situation. Now I might have tunnel-vision because of my peculiar experience as a child, but I recall almost all incidents of physical bullying to be pretty freaking easy to tell who hit who. One heuristic: the aggressor is likely to be the same on the 27th time as it was on times 1 through 26.

Alex3917 18y ago

"It seems to be that the article is confusing neutrality or suspended judgment with avoiding judgment." I think the article has that right, I just think it just confuses what it means to suspend judgment. Saying you don't care who started it isn't the same as suspending judgment pending further investigation; rather, it's a form of jumping to judgment prematurely. Judgment in the case of a fight doesn't have to take the form of a (false) dichotomy; I'd argue that saying it doesn't matter who started it is a third form of judgment. Truly suspending judgment pending further investigation of who started the fight would in fact be the wisest course of action.

joe_the_user 18y ago

It sounds easy to say but I think the author of the article needs to grow up. Sorry, but it doesn't matter who started a fight on the playground. How old is he and he still cares about such things? It actually is wisdom to realize that you should stop caring about who started fights - not always but often. Here's idea. Being mature involves realizing there are many kind of stupidities in the world and that most conflicts involve one kind of stupidity battling another kind of stupidity so neither side is really worth taking.

patio11 18y ago
How old is he and he still cares about such things? I think it is sort of silly for somebody to have to kill himself for other people to give a shit about his physical wellbeing, but since suicide fairly reliably makes people actually care about things, I note that most authorities put the number of suicides as a result of bullying at between one and two dozen a year in the US. This means that bullies are more effective at killing American children than terrorists, school shootings, earthquakes, tornadoes, hurricanes, sharks, and kidnappers motivated by ransom. Combined. But who cares about such things?
- Eliezer 18y ago
  Well said. I really have to wonder whether other people had such different childhoods than mine - if they were actually engaging in spontaneous random playground fights with no aggressor - or if they just have very convenient amnesia. "How old is he and he still cares about such things" - this question is the essence of why not caring is a pretension of wisdom, and I'm glad that the illustration was so nicely provided.
jerf 18y ago
"Sorry, but it doesn't matter who started a fight on the playground." It's an example, not the whole of the argument. And the example is more about the principal than the children. The principal should care about who is starting fights, if they actually want to affect whether there are fights in the future. They don't, for many reasons including ones discussed in the article, so they don't care, either. School examples have the virtue of appealing to most people's common experience.

patio11 18y ago

Figuring out who started it becomes a chicken and an egg situation. Now I might have tunnel-vision because of my peculiar experience as a child, but I recall almost all incidents of physical bullying to be pretty freaking easy to tell who hit who. One heuristic: the aggressor is likely to be the same on the 27th time as it was on times 1 through 26.